Robert Mapplethorpe

In 1990, one year after Robert Mapplethorpe died of AIDS—at age 42—a grand jury indicted the director of Cincinnati’s Contemporary Arts Center for exhibiting Mapplethorpe’s “obscene” photographs. The images in question showed explicit acts of sadomasochistic gay sex—including shots of men with erect penises and a picture of Mapplethorpe himself with a bullwhip inserted into his anus. Ultimately, the grand jury acquitted the museum director and declared the works “art” rather than “pornography,” but the trial left a stigma on the artist. Lost amid this skirmish in the culture wars was the fact that many of Mapplethorpe’s photographs were beautifully uncontroversial. He shot male and female nudes that evoked the essence of classic statuary, his photographs of flowers perfectly captured their delicate nature, and his portraits of New York celebrities like Patti Smith and Deborah Harry had a haunting, soulful quality. “Whether shooting a portrait or a statue, he had the same concerns: lighting, composition and angles,” said Dimitri Levas, Mapplethorpe’s art director. With a quarter century passed since Mapplethorpe’s artistic integrity was put on trial, the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art last spring offered up “Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Medium,” offering a chance to survey the whole range of Mapplethorpe’s work with a fresh eye.

 

Self Portrait, 1985. Courtesy J. Paul Getty Museum © Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation.